It is not easy to find happiness in ourselves, and it is not possible to find it elsewhere.

The essence of humor is that it should be unexpected, that it should embody an element of surprise, that it should startle us out of that reasonable gravity which, after all, must be our habitual frame of mind.

The tourist may complain of other tourists, but he would be lost without them.

Men who believe that, through some exceptional grace or good fortune, they have found God, feel little need of culture.

[Mary Wortley Montagu] wrote more letters, with fewer punctuation marks, than any Englishwoman of her day; and her nephew, the fourth Baron Rokeby, nearly blinded himself in deciphering the two volumes of undated correspondence which were printed in 1810. Two more followed in 1813, after which the gallant Baron either died at his post or was smitten with despair; for sixty-eight cases of letters lay undisturbed ... 'Les morts n'écrivent point,' said Madame de Maintenon hopefully; but of what benefit is this inactivity, when we still continue to receive their letters?

We cannot hope to scale great moral heights by ignoring petty obligations.

When the milk of human kindness turns sour, it is a singularly unpalatable draught.